Are crowds at record highs for this stage of the season?

Tonight on AFL 360, Gillon McLachlan was talking about the gloriousness of the football so far in 2016 when he said that “more people have gone to the football for the first six weeks of the season in the history of the VFL/AFL… more people than ever before.” Is he right?

Yes! After six rounds, a total of 1 941 313 people have been through the turnstiles at AFL games, beating the previous record set in 2008 of 1 927 073 people.

But in 2008 there were eight games per round; nowadays there are nine. The average crowd numbers are still well below the level they reached before the entry of GWS and the Gold Coast into the competition.